Journey is what will stick with Eastlake

Giancarlo Cortez stepped to the top of the dugout and watched the scene unfold.

The more than 28,000 fans peering down at a boy’s diamond. The camera crews scurrying around to get their shots. The smiles on the faces of strangers from another land as they posed with their Little League World Series title banner.

Even at just 12 years old, Cortez knew it was all something to behold.

Giancarlo Cortez and Micah Pietila-Wiggs scooped dirt from in front of their dugout after their loss to Japan in the Little League World Series.

John Gibbins

Giancarlo Cortez and Micah Pietila-Wiggs scooped dirt from in front of their dugout after their loss to Japan in the Little League World Series.

Giancarlo Cortez and Micah Pietila-Wiggs scooped dirt from in front of their dugout after their loss to Japan in the Little League World Series. (John Gibbins)

So he ran his hand through the burnt-orange dirt at historic Howard J. Lamade Stadium and stuffed as much as he could in his used water bottle.

“Just to remember it,” Cortez said.

It will certainly be hard for him to forget.

Really, it will be hard for anyone who latched onto this Chula Vista Eastlake Little League team to forget how this run captivated so many on the way to Sunday’s Little League World Series championship.

In the end, Japan won 6-4 with a few more clutch hits than Eastlake – the fourth San Diego County team in the last 13 years to get here and the second from Chula Vista in the last five years. But it was Japan's ninth championship.

Afterward, the parents who made the more than 2,600-mile trek to South Williamsport flocked to the bungalows to wrap their arms around the boys who’d come so far to finish one win short of their goal.

At least tried to anyway.

As throngs of fans lined up outside the teams’ housing units at Little League International’s complex – many of them wanting an autograph from the shaggy-haired Micah Pietila-Wiggs and Jake Espinoza – Coach Eddy Espinoza did his best to create some space for the team.

The autograph-hounds could find the team at the Genetti Hotel later that night, he told them all. Even the parents – even Espinoza’s wife Lisa – would have to wait until then to finally wrap their arms around their boys after a wild summer that began more than two months ago on the practice fields in Chula Vista.

“I can’t wait to get him home, to tell you the truth,” said Steve Wiggs, Micah’s father. “I would have never have wanted to be home earlier than we had to be, so I’m glad we got to the last game. But it’s going to be nice to be back home and be a family again.”

And the pain won’t last long. How could it?

“They are like brothers,” Lisa Epsinoza said. “They will bring each other up and they will be friends after this. They will laugh and they will play. They are very resilient.”

And not just the Eastlake team, but Tijuana as well.

The Tijuana team bounced back from Saturday’s loss to Japan to win a third-place game over Connecticut earlier Sunday. Manager Francisco Fimbres wiped away the tears of his players, some just before Sunday’s game. And then Tijuana slugged it out in a 15-14 win as dozens of red-clad fans chanted for more and more runs.

They wore sombreros and luche libre masks, waved Mexican flags and even sang “Happy Birthday” – in English – to Jorge Rodriguez during two of his at-bats.

As good as all of that felt, Fimbres can only imagine what awaits his team back home on the other end of this historic run, the city’s first ever trip to South Williamsport in the fourth-year history of the team.

“I know all Tijuana and Mexico feels proud of us,” Fimbres said through an interpreter. “Being the first time that the league is here, I think it’s a great accomplishment – a great job by the kids.”

Even 13-year-old pitcher Luis Manzo found a way to appreciate the accomplishments during a time of personal tragedy. His grandfather watching the games on TV back home in Rosarito, Mexico, suffered a fatal heart attack in the first inning Saturday.

“I really tried not to think about it,” Manso said through an interpreter as he addressed the media after Tijuana’s win. “I tried to play and keep my

This game, of course, can ease a lot of pain – just strap on those cleats, throw that glove on and find a patch of grass somewhere.

Many of Eastlake’s kids will do just that as soon as next week, manager Rick Tibbett said. Although there is plenty of business to attend to before then.

Like algebra and essays and home room – not run.

“We’ll be happy to get home – and work,” Tibbett said. “We started school on July 25 and they went to school the first day. That’s the last day they went to school, so Tuesday they better be in school.”

Not that these Chula Vista kids haven’t been learning along the way – aside from the assignments they’ve completed while on the road.

“They are missing school right now, but these are life lessons,” said Erwin Mora, Nick Mora's father and one of dozens of yellow-clad fans chanting “Eastlake” throughout Sunday’s game. “You fight through adversity. If it doesn’t go your way, you fight through it. They fought their way the whole way here.”

And here is what Cortez wants to remember. Not the sting of a loss, but the journey.

So he wiped away some tears and emerged from Eastlake’s dorm to meet a few last requests.

He even managed to crack a smile or two as he signed a few more hats and balls and jerseys as the sun bean to set on Lamade Stadium.

“It feels good,” Cortez said. “You might never do this again, so enjoy it while it lasts.”